PCA will try some new wrinkles in non-district game

By SKIP LEON Skip.Leon@hearstnp.com

Published 8:35 am, Thursday, October 22, 2015

Photo: Skip Leon/Plainview Herald

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Plainview Christian Academy running back Konner Smith gets low and prepares for contact with a Lazbuddie defender during a game earlier this season. The Eagles will try some different things when they travel to Lubbock Home School for a non-district game tonight. less

Plainview Christian Academy running back Konner Smith gets low and prepares for contact with a Lazbuddie defender during a game earlier this season. The Eagles will try some different things when they travel to ... more

Photo: Skip Leon/Plainview Herald

PCA will try some new wrinkles in non-district game

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Even with a non-district six-man football game at Lubbock Home School tonight, Plainview Christian Academy coach Lucas Hall is looking ahead to the final two district games and how his team can forge a couple of victories and qualify for the postseason playoffs.

With that in mind, today’s 7:30 p.m. contest in Lubbock is a chance for the Eagles to throw a few wrinkles into their game, especially on defense.

“The nice thing about this game is it isn’t a district game,” Hall said before practice Tuesday afternoon. “We want to win every game, but this isn’t a district game. So, we’re going to try some things out. We’re going to try people at different positions and get them out of their comfort zone a little bit.”

And, the Eagles will have a few things on defense that they’ll work on in hopes they can use them against Denton Calvary and Carrollton Christian in their remaining district contests.

“We have defensive stunts that we haven’t wanted to show anybody in district,” said Hall, whose team defeated Dallas Fairhill 37-6 in its district opener last week. “Lubbock Home School isn’t in our district and we’re in district play, so we might as well work on it now where you didn’t want to work on it before because you didn’t know if you were ready for it.”

Hall said he will stick with the 2-2-2 defensive alignment that his team has had success with in the past two games, both victories. But he has added some variations for this game.

“They’re comfortable in that (2-2-2),” Hall said. “And we’ve added some stunts on defense as far as blitzes and slants with the defensive line and the linebackers. We’ve got four different defenses. We’re going to try them all out and see.”

Hall said Lubbock Home School is a balanced offense capable of running or passing the ball. They do a lot of different things, he said.

“Offensively, they’re going to show you a lot of different formations,” Hall said. “Most of them are going to be tight sets. You’re going to see a lot of ‘I’ and ‘T’ and stuff like that. They’re going to use their linemen on pass routes quite a bit. They’re pretty versatile as far as they don’t just run the ball or don’t just throw the ball. They’re pretty balanced.”

Hall said he expects the Titans to be fast and have some size.

“I would imagine they have some pretty good speed,” Hall said. “Typically, they have some good-sized guys and they’re fairly athletic. But it’s kind of like every week. You don’t really know what you’re going to get until you get there.”

Hall said when Lubbock Home School throws the ball, they’re going for home runs most of the time.

“The thing we’ve noticed, as of right now, is that on their deep routes they’re mainly going for the bomb,” Hall said. “That makes me think that they’ve probably got some good breakaway speed. Their quarterback, if it’s the same kid as last year, has a pretty decent arm.”

Hall said he expects the Titans to line up in a 3-3 defensive set, which is similar to how Dallas Fairhill lined up last week. But the Titans possess more team speed.

“I think you’ll see them in more of a 3-3 look and they’ll be spaced out a little bit more than most people we play. That’s mainly because they’ve got better speed,” Hall said.

Regardless of the defense, the offensive game plan for PCA remains the same. The Eagles are all about establishing the running game. Their main back is senior Konner Smith, a bruising ballcarrier with the ability to break tackles and enough speed to break off long runs if he gets into the clear.

Hall said the PCA offense is based on being able to run the ball.

“It’s not going to be a whole lot different than what we’ve been doing,” the coach said. “Our offense is based around using four or five basic running plays to set up the rest of the offense. We do a lot of play-action stuff. But you can’t do the play-action until you’ve done the run. We’ve got to establish some things, make them take away the run.”

Hall said he wants his team to play better than they did at Fairhill, where they got off to a slow start in the first half but erupted for 31 second-half points to win going away. He said it was a matter of his players getting into the right frame of mind at halftime.

“They realized that they could beat that team,” Hall said. “I could say whatever I wanted to them at halftime, but it’s a thing where each individual player has to figure it out on their own, whether or not I can beat the guy that’s lined up against me. And when they figured that out, we started hitting people pretty hard.”

After tonight’s game, the Eagles return to Plainview for their final home game against defending district champion Denton Calvary on Oct. 30. They close out their regular season at Carrollton Christian Nov. 6.